Around 26 per cent of results will be A or A* and for many this will mean a
chance to go on to university

Next Thursday is A-level results day, a time of anxious waiting and, hopefully, joy at having been awarded the right grades. It is estimated that around 26 per cent of results will be A or A* and for many this will mean a chance to go on to university. The Coalition has changed the rules to ensure that universities can accommodate extra students who meet the grade requirements: the number of students holding provisional places at the end of July was up by more than 12,000 in a year. Research conducted by this newspaper has found that most universities will have places in clearing and many are offering lucrative incentives – cheap accommodation, handheld computers and even cash awards – to draw applicants on to certain courses.

Of course, increased university attendance is not automatically a solution to all of Britain’s problems. On the contrary, the Labour government’s unrealistic targets for graduation, along with the proliferation of vanity courses, devalued the entire higher education sector. As a result the taxpayer had to pick up the tab for those going to university for the sake of going to university – a luxury that left many graduates drowning in debt.

But there is nothing wrong with good students pursuing good courses for the purpose of either increasing their earning potential or genuinely wishing to enrich their mind. Healthy legacies from the Michael Gove era at the education department included stamping out grade inflation and removing January exams, which forced pupils to sit all their tests in the summer, reducing the opportunities to bump up their grades. If the bright and hard-working are rewarded with the golden opportunity to pursue an undergraduate degree, then that is a good thing. We wish all of next week’s dreamers the best of luck.